D14D
01-27-2009, 03:32 PM
Ambassador Report
January 2009
Hello Matchbox world! I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful holiday season, may you have made your favorite retailer happy by emptying his pegs and leaving your money! May those retailers have made your collections happy with the assorted blisters, 5 packs, 10 packs, play sets and more!
The 2009 1-100 line have started to appear at your favorite retailers; batch A was released in December, batch B will be out shortly. The official US/LAAM/ROW lists are being finalized by the Matchbox Team and will be published shortly.
Batch A issues include the final 2008 models and the introduction of 2009.
The new 5 packs will be as follows:
1. Construction
2. Fire
3. Classic Rides
4. Spring Playset (Action Themed)
5. Service Center
6. Police
7. Modern Rides
8. Desert Adventure
9. Vacation Road Trip
10. City Action
11. Farm
12. Fall playset
As this is the 2009 list, a question was raised to have trailers included in the 5 and/or 10 packs. Another question was in regards to special themed categories of fire and police. The answers to those questions were “yes?” a possibility for 2010? Ask and you will get the Matchbox designers thinking!
New playsets:
1. Dragon Castle
2. Crocodile Escape
3. Construction City
4. Recycle Center
5. Dino Set
6. Police City
7. Harbor City
8. Fire Truck
9. Drive Through
10. Car Service Center
11. Off Road Rider
Licensed TV Heroes:
1. Go Diego Go
2. Spongebob
3. Handy Manny
4. Scooby-Doo
5. Nick & Nick Jr.
6. Little Einsteins
7. Mickey Mouse Club House
Best of British:
1. 2008 Lotus Evora – Green
2. Austin Minivan – Blue
3. ’07 Ford Transit Van – White
4. Bentley Continental GT – Blue
5. Range Rover Sport – Red
6. Morgan Aeromax – Red
7. Austin FX4 London Taxi – Gold
8. Routemaster Bus – Red
9. 1961 Jaguar E-type – Green
10. Land Rover Defender 110 – Black
11. Tractor – Orange
12. Jaguar XK – Cream
The Retail chains will have the B-O-B line in January; the Alternate Channels/Dealers will have the line available around June.
The 10 Packs will have the ’70 Cuda and ’95 Mustang Cobra for the exclusive color models. The Mustang Cobra is under going a tool repair; there will be some minor interior detail variations due to the different tooling methods from MBK (Mattel-Bangkok, Thailand factory). The packs with the Cobra should start appearing after April.
The Cuda colors are:
-Bright Orange / black interior
-Solid Black / black interior
-Solid Lime Green / black interior
-Metallic Purple / black interior
The Cobra colors are:
-Bright red / black interior
-Gold Metallic / black interior
-Solid Black / tan interior
-Metallic Blue / gray interior
The contents of the first “Real” themed pack are:
-’65 Austin Minivan - pearl white
-Porsche 911 Turbo - brown
-VW Golf GTI VR6 – dark gray
-Ford GT – flat black
-Opel Speedster - blue
-’57 Cadillac Eldorado – metallic blue
-Jaguar XK – light metallic blue
-Volvo C30 - red
-Porsche Cayenne Turbo - silver
-’70 El Camino – yellow
Packaging enthusiasts will note the package height is shorter by about an inch.
The new wheel that debuted on the Garbage Truck last year was temporarily pulled off-line due to being labor intensive in the assembly process. It will reappear for use in the Superfast and Best of … series.
Variations abound! As previously reported of the Mustang GT Concept, there will be a tampo variation created. A silver stripe is added to the hood area in addition to the current taillight detailing.
The new lighter shade of metallic lime green used on the Mazda 2 actually represents the factory color as opposed to the original darker metallic lime green.
The Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GTA was born in 2007 as such a beautiful casting, yet was doomed as it could only be painted in white or red (metallics were a technicality?). Well, leave it to the brilliant Matchbox engineers to give the casting new life. The mold will be modified to become the Alfa Romeo Junior 1300. The color palette will be extended, the specifics are to be determined at this point. We should see this morsel appear in the 2010 line.
The Euro Edition line is released in Germany, will have a run of 40000 of each and sport a new larger packaging for 2009.
Superfast models will be appearing at your local Wal*Marts soon, the release is slated for late January. Come springtime (about April 1st), Toys R Us will have the line on their shelves, as will the alternate channels, a.k.a. the Matchbox Dealers.
The mail-in premium vehicle will be had by a voucher inside the box that comes with the model. The packaging will be the same clear box and clear insert securing the vehicle atop the box. A sneak peek of the packaging showed us #4 to be the Cadillac Sedan DeVille in pearl white with maroon interior.
The mail-in premium will be handled in the U.S. only; no shipments will be made to overseas/Canada.
The Disney Theme Parks will once again have their exclusive models. 2008 was a red MCI coach/ Skybuster, 2009 will be in blue.
The DVD & 2 model sets distributed in Canada will not continue in 2009 due to lack of interest. The last set, Fire, will not be produced. The other sets that were produced are:
“Trash Titans” with the Guzzler and Trash Truck; “Construction Kings” with the Bulldozer and Excavator; “Junkyard Giants” with the Tractor Shovel and Demolition Machine.
A couple of Seasonal packs are in the schedule; there will be Easter and Christmas/Holiday. Models and colors are TBD.
The secret date coding appearing on the model bases is quite simple. “A” represents 2008, “B” will represent 2009 and so on. The 2 digit numeric code represents the week of the year the model was produced. “A52” would designate the 52nd week of 2008; “B04” would designate the 4th week of 2009. This will let you know how “fresh” your Matchbox is, as well as verifying which manufacturing lot it came from.
Skybusters will once again have 36 models for 2009. 3 new castings will also be offered. They will be generic models of a contemporary jet design; based on the business jet-type airframe. The models planned are: 1. Twin boom (propeller), 2. Pusher Prop and 3. Vintage style Bi-plane.
The “Real Working Rigs” are at your local Wal*Mart and Target retailers. The first models in the series are the Pierce Quantum Arial Ladder with The Bernalillo County Fire Department (New Mexico) livery; the 2009 Autocar ACX Garbage Truck with Waste Management and CRS- Consolidated Refuse System liveries; the 2007 Mercedes Actros Cement Mixer with King Concrete and Tom’s Cement liveries.
All three models as the future models to be released have some intricate moving features which add some terrific play value for the kids and big kids!
The manufacturing (MAN) code numbers for the Real Working Rigs series to date are as follows:
RW001 - Mercedes Actros Cement Truck
RW002 - Autocar ACX Garbage Truck
RW003 - Pierce Quantum 75' Aerial Ladder Truck
RW004 - Western Star 6900XD Wrecker
RW005 - International Workstar Dumptruck
RW006 - International DuraStar™ Flatbed
RW007 - Kenworth™ T800 Roll Off Truck
RW008 - Bulldozer
RW009 - MAN TGS Stakebed
With the advent of the Pierce ladder truck in the Real Working Rigs and the 1-100 line, we reminisce of the Meanstick, which was produced for the 2002 Birthday party. It was issued as a Matchbox Collectible in red or gold, with one very special edition bejeweled with precious stones. The bejeweled version was sold on eBay during the Matchbox International Toy Show, netting a hefty 5-figure bounty, in which a charity benefited. The tooling is reported to be in Hong Kong and may be reviewed by the Matchbox Team.
How does Hummelstown, PA get to have a Matchbox replica of their Dodge Charger police vehicle? They are an award winner of the ”Best Deco’d Cop Car.”
The 2009 Line Preview will be held off for 2010. The previous preview (2008) was held 2 years after the first (2006), the Marketing Team would like to keep it “fresh and exciting” for those attending. I wonder if it was due to my Ambassador appointment that the Line Preview was pushed out? I went for a dip in the pool last year, so I knew I had bathed; I don’t think I had gotten too much BBQ sauce on the prototypes during lunch. I kind of wondered why Felix & Dave didn’t like my DLM demonstration from the engineering samples, they are toys, after all. All kidding aside, it does take a lot of energies to put on a presentation as the Team performed, it is greatly appreciated and will be anticipated with baited breath.
Well, this is my story for now. Thanks to the team for answering my long list of collector questions and providing the information on the upcoming product. I am looking forward to my next telecon with them to deliver more info for our collector world. Until the next time, enjoy your Matchbox!
Terry Ozima
Matchbox Ambassador 4
January 2009
Hello Matchbox world! I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful holiday season, may you have made your favorite retailer happy by emptying his pegs and leaving your money! May those retailers have made your collections happy with the assorted blisters, 5 packs, 10 packs, play sets and more!
The 2009 1-100 line have started to appear at your favorite retailers; batch A was released in December, batch B will be out shortly. The official US/LAAM/ROW lists are being finalized by the Matchbox Team and will be published shortly.
Batch A issues include the final 2008 models and the introduction of 2009.
The new 5 packs will be as follows:
1. Construction
2. Fire
3. Classic Rides
4. Spring Playset (Action Themed)
5. Service Center
6. Police
7. Modern Rides
8. Desert Adventure
9. Vacation Road Trip
10. City Action
11. Farm
12. Fall playset
As this is the 2009 list, a question was raised to have trailers included in the 5 and/or 10 packs. Another question was in regards to special themed categories of fire and police. The answers to those questions were “yes?” a possibility for 2010? Ask and you will get the Matchbox designers thinking!
New playsets:
1. Dragon Castle
2. Crocodile Escape
3. Construction City
4. Recycle Center
5. Dino Set
6. Police City
7. Harbor City
8. Fire Truck
9. Drive Through
10. Car Service Center
11. Off Road Rider
Licensed TV Heroes:
1. Go Diego Go
2. Spongebob
3. Handy Manny
4. Scooby-Doo
5. Nick & Nick Jr.
6. Little Einsteins
7. Mickey Mouse Club House
Best of British:
1. 2008 Lotus Evora – Green
2. Austin Minivan – Blue
3. ’07 Ford Transit Van – White
4. Bentley Continental GT – Blue
5. Range Rover Sport – Red
6. Morgan Aeromax – Red
7. Austin FX4 London Taxi – Gold
8. Routemaster Bus – Red
9. 1961 Jaguar E-type – Green
10. Land Rover Defender 110 – Black
11. Tractor – Orange
12. Jaguar XK – Cream
The Retail chains will have the B-O-B line in January; the Alternate Channels/Dealers will have the line available around June.
The 10 Packs will have the ’70 Cuda and ’95 Mustang Cobra for the exclusive color models. The Mustang Cobra is under going a tool repair; there will be some minor interior detail variations due to the different tooling methods from MBK (Mattel-Bangkok, Thailand factory). The packs with the Cobra should start appearing after April.
The Cuda colors are:
-Bright Orange / black interior
-Solid Black / black interior
-Solid Lime Green / black interior
-Metallic Purple / black interior
The Cobra colors are:
-Bright red / black interior
-Gold Metallic / black interior
-Solid Black / tan interior
-Metallic Blue / gray interior
The contents of the first “Real” themed pack are:
-’65 Austin Minivan - pearl white
-Porsche 911 Turbo - brown
-VW Golf GTI VR6 – dark gray
-Ford GT – flat black
-Opel Speedster - blue
-’57 Cadillac Eldorado – metallic blue
-Jaguar XK – light metallic blue
-Volvo C30 - red
-Porsche Cayenne Turbo - silver
-’70 El Camino – yellow
Packaging enthusiasts will note the package height is shorter by about an inch.
The new wheel that debuted on the Garbage Truck last year was temporarily pulled off-line due to being labor intensive in the assembly process. It will reappear for use in the Superfast and Best of … series.
Variations abound! As previously reported of the Mustang GT Concept, there will be a tampo variation created. A silver stripe is added to the hood area in addition to the current taillight detailing.
The new lighter shade of metallic lime green used on the Mazda 2 actually represents the factory color as opposed to the original darker metallic lime green.
The Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GTA was born in 2007 as such a beautiful casting, yet was doomed as it could only be painted in white or red (metallics were a technicality?). Well, leave it to the brilliant Matchbox engineers to give the casting new life. The mold will be modified to become the Alfa Romeo Junior 1300. The color palette will be extended, the specifics are to be determined at this point. We should see this morsel appear in the 2010 line.
The Euro Edition line is released in Germany, will have a run of 40000 of each and sport a new larger packaging for 2009.
Superfast models will be appearing at your local Wal*Marts soon, the release is slated for late January. Come springtime (about April 1st), Toys R Us will have the line on their shelves, as will the alternate channels, a.k.a. the Matchbox Dealers.
The mail-in premium vehicle will be had by a voucher inside the box that comes with the model. The packaging will be the same clear box and clear insert securing the vehicle atop the box. A sneak peek of the packaging showed us #4 to be the Cadillac Sedan DeVille in pearl white with maroon interior.
The mail-in premium will be handled in the U.S. only; no shipments will be made to overseas/Canada.
The Disney Theme Parks will once again have their exclusive models. 2008 was a red MCI coach/ Skybuster, 2009 will be in blue.
The DVD & 2 model sets distributed in Canada will not continue in 2009 due to lack of interest. The last set, Fire, will not be produced. The other sets that were produced are:
“Trash Titans” with the Guzzler and Trash Truck; “Construction Kings” with the Bulldozer and Excavator; “Junkyard Giants” with the Tractor Shovel and Demolition Machine.
A couple of Seasonal packs are in the schedule; there will be Easter and Christmas/Holiday. Models and colors are TBD.
The secret date coding appearing on the model bases is quite simple. “A” represents 2008, “B” will represent 2009 and so on. The 2 digit numeric code represents the week of the year the model was produced. “A52” would designate the 52nd week of 2008; “B04” would designate the 4th week of 2009. This will let you know how “fresh” your Matchbox is, as well as verifying which manufacturing lot it came from.
Skybusters will once again have 36 models for 2009. 3 new castings will also be offered. They will be generic models of a contemporary jet design; based on the business jet-type airframe. The models planned are: 1. Twin boom (propeller), 2. Pusher Prop and 3. Vintage style Bi-plane.
The “Real Working Rigs” are at your local Wal*Mart and Target retailers. The first models in the series are the Pierce Quantum Arial Ladder with The Bernalillo County Fire Department (New Mexico) livery; the 2009 Autocar ACX Garbage Truck with Waste Management and CRS- Consolidated Refuse System liveries; the 2007 Mercedes Actros Cement Mixer with King Concrete and Tom’s Cement liveries.
All three models as the future models to be released have some intricate moving features which add some terrific play value for the kids and big kids!
The manufacturing (MAN) code numbers for the Real Working Rigs series to date are as follows:
RW001 - Mercedes Actros Cement Truck
RW002 - Autocar ACX Garbage Truck
RW003 - Pierce Quantum 75' Aerial Ladder Truck
RW004 - Western Star 6900XD Wrecker
RW005 - International Workstar Dumptruck
RW006 - International DuraStar™ Flatbed
RW007 - Kenworth™ T800 Roll Off Truck
RW008 - Bulldozer
RW009 - MAN TGS Stakebed
With the advent of the Pierce ladder truck in the Real Working Rigs and the 1-100 line, we reminisce of the Meanstick, which was produced for the 2002 Birthday party. It was issued as a Matchbox Collectible in red or gold, with one very special edition bejeweled with precious stones. The bejeweled version was sold on eBay during the Matchbox International Toy Show, netting a hefty 5-figure bounty, in which a charity benefited. The tooling is reported to be in Hong Kong and may be reviewed by the Matchbox Team.
How does Hummelstown, PA get to have a Matchbox replica of their Dodge Charger police vehicle? They are an award winner of the ”Best Deco’d Cop Car.”
The 2009 Line Preview will be held off for 2010. The previous preview (2008) was held 2 years after the first (2006), the Marketing Team would like to keep it “fresh and exciting” for those attending. I wonder if it was due to my Ambassador appointment that the Line Preview was pushed out? I went for a dip in the pool last year, so I knew I had bathed; I don’t think I had gotten too much BBQ sauce on the prototypes during lunch. I kind of wondered why Felix & Dave didn’t like my DLM demonstration from the engineering samples, they are toys, after all. All kidding aside, it does take a lot of energies to put on a presentation as the Team performed, it is greatly appreciated and will be anticipated with baited breath.
Well, this is my story for now. Thanks to the team for answering my long list of collector questions and providing the information on the upcoming product. I am looking forward to my next telecon with them to deliver more info for our collector world. Until the next time, enjoy your Matchbox!
Terry Ozima
Matchbox Ambassador 4